A Modern Myth
by Jon'ic Recheio
Summary: Going to random places when you're bored can never end well. Well, maybe only if you're the Doctor. And you go to Cardiff. And someone gets kidnapped. Don't say you weren't warned. Adventure awaits in the great unknown...Doctor Who/Torchwood Crossover
1. Discovery is always better in space

Right. This is my first Doctor Who fic, so tell me as honestly as possible what you think so I can improve in the future. Have fun, and read on! Oh, and it'sa Torchwood crossover. I just couldn't resist. grin

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The Doctor blinked his eyes and scrubbed at them roughly, trying to alleviate the dry, itchy feel. It happened to even him if he stared at the same spot for too long. He was sure his eyes were bloodshot by now. The aqua blue light of the TARDIS' main console mesmerized him as he tried to work on her delicate insides. Not needing to sleep didn't excuse him from eye strain or exhaustion. He needed to lie down and drift for a while.

He didn't really like doing that, though.

It gave him too much time with his own distressing thoughts. With Martha gone, he really needed _someone_, _anyone_ to travel with. It helped keep his mind from thinking about the unpleasant things of traveling. Like all of the time spent running for your life or someone else's. He sighed and sat back on his heels, hands dangling from his knees. It was no use. He was too tired to fiddle with the TARDIS right now. He'd probably end up breaking something with his luck, anyway.

"Well," he said to the air as he stood, "time to move, then. Always something interesting goin' on somewhere."

With that, he rapidly pulled levers, switched switches and pressed buttons, all the while grinning like a loon. He loved to travel.

DWT

Cale jumped, blue eyes going wide with surprise for a brief moment when he heard a strange grinding sound in the middle of an usually quiet hallway. Frowning in confusion, he peered cautiously around the corner to catch sight of a blue box appearing out of thin air. It wasn't that unusual in his time, but Cale still watched with wide-eyed fascination, hand gripping the butt of his sonic-blaster tightly. Never hurt to be prepared.

The blue box was fully solid and all was quiet for a few, long, tense moments before the doors were suddenly flung open. Cale drew his blaster and stepped into the hallway, a guarded expression on his teenage face. Most people that appeared out of thin air in the 51st century were Time Agents, even though the Agency had collapsed eight years ago. He didn't fancy running into an ex-Agent unarmed, no matter the circumstances.

He watched with cautious interest as a man stepped out if the machine with a wide grin on his face that barely made it to his eyes. Cale wondered briefly why he was lying. He leveled his blaster dead center on the man's forehead.

"Well, hello." the man greeted cordially, unperturbed by the sight of Cale and his gun. What danger was a ragged looking kid holding a gun with shaking hands anyway?

"Hi." Cale responded blandly, keeping a firm hold on his fear. He wanted nothing more than to sprint back down the hallway, but that wasn't an option now. He took in a deep breath and steadied his gun. "Who are you?"

"You aren't the guard." The man observed. His head swiveled about, taking in his environment. Sleek, shining metal with no lines or gaps, and light that seemed to come from nowhere. He finished his perusal quickly, then focused his eyes back to Cale.

"51st century, yeah?"

"Yup." Cale answered swiftly. He groaned silently to himself, defenses relaxing just a little. "Lemme guess, I just found myself a Time Traveler? Is the Agency, or rather, what's left of it, lookin' for ya? Because, I _really_ don't wanna be here when they show up. Have enough trouble as it is, anyway."

"Well, we could have a proper discussion if you would just lower your gun." The man responded mildly, finally addressing the issue of Cale's choice of arms.

Cale sighed, rolled his eyes skyward, then lowered his weapon. Something about this man told him not to be afraid, that he wasn't going to harm Cale. It seemed odd, but Cale had always trusted his instincts. They hadn't been wrong yet. He snapped the gun into its holster, then crossed his arms, eyeing the man expectantly.

"Right. Well. No, the Time Agency _isn't_ looking for me. I'm just a traveler. My name is the Doctor, what's yours?" He asked with a smile, walking closer to Cale.

"Cale." He answered shortly, distrust shining from his eyes. "Why here? If you can go anywhere, that is."

"Picked at random." the Doctor replied with a shrug, hands lodged in his pockets. "When you can go anywhere, you run out of ideas eventually."

"True." Cale acknowledged, smiling briefly. He looked around nervously, suddenly remembering why he was there in the first place. "We should go. It's not safe here. I'd move that box of yours, if I were you. There's ex-Time Agents crawling all over this place and if they find it…"

"Hmm." The Doctor frowned in though before smiling brightly. "Need a lift?"

"To where?" Cale asked, interest peaked. This may be his chance, a real chance to actually look for his answers.

"Anywhere but here." The Doctor responded, still grinning.

"Could you help me find someone?" Cale inquired tentatively, trying hard not to get his hopes up. He wasn't sure how much he could trust this "Doctor" anyway. No use spilling his life story just yet.

"Sure. Why not?" The Doctor began to bounce on the balls of his feet, impatience making itself known.

"Great. Let's go!" Cale exclaimed, genuine smile on his face. He'd done it, he'd found his chance. Now all he had to do was find the answers. Unfortunately, those were always harder to come by, especially these days.

"You bet." The Doctor grinned brightly again, and this time, Cale noticed, it made it all the way to his eyes. The Doctor waved at Cale over his shoulder as he bounded back into the TARDIS.

Cale shook his head wryly and followed after, carefully shutting the doors behind himself. A strange, warm sort of hum filled his mind, buzzing in his ears and against the inside of his skull. He smiled and walked towards the center of the machine, which was seemingly impossibly bigger on the inside. He'd never seen one thing so radically defy the laws of physics before. It made his head spin.

"_Spinning, spinning, spinning. Time and space, ours for the winning…_"

"What was that?" Cale asked, doing a swift three-sixty in an attempt to locate the source of the voice. His heart was suddenly pounding in his ears. Maybe this hadn't been such a good idea…

"What was what?" The Doctor asked, a frown marring his features as he regarded Cale from the other side of the middle, glowing aqua console.

"That voice." Cale responded, walking slowly closer to the main console and up the metal ramp. His footsteps clanged loudly in his over-sensitive ears.

"What voice?" The Doctor walked around the console to look at Cale closer, eyes darkening with suspicion.

"It said something about spinnin' and winnin'. Didn't really make a whole lotta sense." Cale told him, blue eyes rapidly scanning the inside of the ship. He ran his hands through his shaggy brown hair, grabbing briefly before letting go. He spun around again, before facing the Doctor once more.

"Did you hear it too? I mean it's your ship, you should've…"

"I heard it." The Doctor seemed stunned, wary, and pleased all at once. "But the question is, how did you?"

"Wait a minute!" Cale exclaimed suddenly, eyes going wide. He began to gesture wildly with his hands. "This ship _talks_? It's _alive_? Holy hell!"

"The TARDIS is sentient, yes." The Doctor answered, the beginnings of another grin on his face. He began to talk a mile a minute. "This is amazing; I've never met a human who could hear her. Well, Jack could sometimes, and Rose could feel her, but only after they had been here awhile. It's astounding; you must be a fairly accomplished psychic. Who are your parents? Where were you born?"

"Whoa, be kind, rewind, and slow down!" Cale abruptly derailed the Doctor's hail of questions, holding his hands up in a gesture of surrender. He shook his head and took in a deep breath, trying to get a handle on his own racing thoughts. "I don't know where I was born, and my parents are the people I'm lookin' for. And, what the hell is a psychic?"

"You don't know where you were born?" The Doctor asked, frowning in thought. His brown eyes shone his curiosity.

"And, further more, who says I'm human?" Cale demanded suddenly, blue eyes flashing in anger. "I don't even know, dammit!"

"Ah, that would explain it, then." The Doctor replied, a knowing look on his face. He rubbed his chin briefly before walking over to the controls. "I'll get us out of here, and then we can run some tests. The TARDIS has a fully equipped medical bay on board. You tend to need it the places I go."

"That's so comforting." Cale muttered sarcastically. He walked over to the main console and found something to hold onto. The helpful little voice in his head told him this was going to be a bumpy ride. The voice was never wrong.

"I know, isn't it?" The Doctor threw him a manic grin, and rapidly began to pres, pull, push and kick what seemed like random parts of the console.

Cale just watched him with wide-eyed, mildly frightened, interest. He wasn't sure if he could trust a ship this eccentric man had to kick to get working. It all seemed so surreal to him. He was sure it would sink in eventually, then he would be grinning wider than that loony Doctor who seemed to have taken a liking to Cale. Cale couldn't explain why, but he didn't really want to, either. Who was he to look a gift horse in the mouth anyway?

He'd been handed is greatest dream on a gold, shining platter, why turn it away? No matter how daft the pilot seemed. To Cale, it added to the adventure really. It gave him hope that this strange slip of a man could help him find the answers he had been craving since he broke out of the Time Agency lab eight years ago. The fall of that place had been his salvation. At six years old, he couldn't understand why they hurt, him, tested him.

Maybe this "Doctor" could tell him why his parents left him in that hell?

"Whoa!" Cale exclaimed, as a loud whine filled the spacious cabin, and the ship began to lurch alarmingly. Cale would swear before a judge he heard metal clanging, glass breaking, and sparks flying as they got moving.

Through time and space, no less.

Cale felt his face split into a grin. He was traveling through time and space. He was _traveling_ through _time_ and _space_!

"Yes!" Cale and the Doctor exclaimed at the same time, sharing similar grins.

Cale smirked over at the Doctor as the shaking and whining stopped. He let go of his white knuckled grip on a handle that had appeared out of nowhere and nearly sprinted over to the main console.

"That was insane!" Cale told him, eyes bright with happiness. "Completely, wonderfully insane! I can't believe…do you always feel that rush in your mind?"

The Doctor grinned, then suddenly, he seemed absolutely floored. His brown eyes were wide and he regarded Cale as if he was seeing him for the first time. "You felt _that_ too? Right, that's it. Medbay, answers, now! No more dilly-dallying. I want to know just exactly _what _you are, Cale."

"You and me both." Despite the feeling of dread growing in his stomach, Cale followed the Doctor, grin still firmly lodged on his face. It felt like nothing in the world could wipe it off his face at the moment.

"_We travel, and dabble. Here, the universe will unravel. Listen now, the stars have begun to call…Smile boy, this is the best day of all…_"

"Wow." Cale breathed, absently rubbing his right ear. "Did she just…?"

"Yes, I believe she did." The Doctor answered, the same sort of wonder in his voice. He seemed faraway as they stood outside of a closed door. He suddenly snapped back into himself. "Sorry. We're here."

The door slid open automatically and the Doctor led Cale into the room and over to an examination table. It looked to be made out of the same rock the TARDIS controls were, but the bed on top was just a regular hospital mattress, minus the annoying, crinkly white paper that seemed to cover every bed.

The aqua blue veins running up and down the walls in no particular pattern seemed to pulse brightly for a moment, before returning to their normal glow. Cale took all this in with wide, curious eyes, his previous distrust of the Doctor and his ship completely forgotten. He actually felt safe here, like this should have been his home forever, like it had been once. He knew different, though. The little voice in his head said so.

"Right. Now, sit down there and lie back. This should only take a moment." The Doctor told him briskly, mind focused on booting up the software he needed.

Cale nodded, even though the Doctor couldn't see him, and climbed onto the bed, lying slowly back. He hated hospitals, hated this sort of situation, but he was willing to do this for answers. It didn't matter if this scared him witless, he was going to be brave and do this. He had too, needed too. He needed to banish the Time Agency from his mind, and overcoming his fear seemed to be the best way to go about it. After all, if he wasn't afraid of them, they couldn't continue to ruin his life from the grave anymore.

"This, uh, this isn't gonna hurt, is it?" Cale asked slowly, fighting to keep his voice level. He wasn't at all sure he could go through with this if it hurt. That would be too much, too soon. Or, maybe too late.

"Whatever gave you that idea?" The Doctor spun quickly on his heels, briefly making Cale's head spin. "Medical analysis is painless in the 51st century." he paused, brow furrowing for a second. "Isn't it?"

"Uh, yeah, sure, painless." Cale lied quickly, heart going quicker. He gave a strained laugh. "Whatever gave me that absurd idea? Sorry, Doc, continue on."

"Yeah, sure." The Doctor answered slowly, not at all believing Cale or his answer. He began to press a series of buttons and a blue light started to emanate from the ceiling. "Here we go. We'll have our answers in a New York, minute Cale. What do you think of that, eh?"

"Peachy." Cale responded tersely, tensing his muscles in an attempt to keep himself from leaping off of the bed. The last scanning laser that had run over him had given him first degree burns on all of his exposed skin.

He could feel the sweat begin to gather in between his shoulder blades as the light focused into a wide beam and began to sweep over him, starting at his boot-covered feet. He swallowed thickly past the lump in his throat, well aware his breathing had increased and his blood pressure skyrocketed. The scan would show that, he realized. Cale forced his eyes to stay open against the images flashing behind his eyes. White covered faces, metallic voices and painful yellow lights that burned you from a sterile sky.

The aqua colored light began to inch it's way up his legs and Cale bit harshly at his bottom lip to keep himself quiet. The urge to squirm was making his arms and legs burn with the tension. The light was at his waist. He couldn't do this. He couldn't do this. It was going to burn him, take his face off. He couldn't do this. The white faces leaned in, sneers in their eyes as they regarded him. He begged them to let him go through the haze of pain.

This wasn't going to--

"Cale!" Cale gasped, and flung himself upright, wide, terror filled eyes finding the Doctor immediately.

His chest heaved as he watched his unlikely savior, adrenaline pounding through his veins. He could hear the double echo of his heart in his ears as he scanned the room, looking for the white clad men and women. They would be here in a moment to take him away, he was sure. He wasn't going to be able to leave, it was impossible. They owned him from the grave.

"Cale, you're alright. You're on the TARDIS, in the Medbay. This isn't wherever it is you are. Listen to me, Cale. Calm down and breath, you're alright, you're safe. No one is going to hurt you here. You have my word on that, by the way." The Doctor smiled carefully at him, not wanting to scare the teen. He looked like he would either bolt or pass out without warning any second.

"Ye-yeah." Cale stuttered out, swallowing past the lump in his dry throat. He tried to control his breathing and slow it down. It didn't really work. His wide blue eyes focused on the Doctor again. "S-so, uh, what's the, um, verdict, Doc?"

"Verdict? Oh! Right, of course!" The Doctor rushed over to the only screen in the entire room and stared at it intently.

The only symbols Cale could see on the screen were foreign, alien, but beautiful nonetheless. He couldn't understand a word, but the letters seemed to draw him in, enticing his mind to try and figure out their meaning. He had a feeling that would be the feat of a lifetime.

"_Poor, scared little boy. No more pain now, it's all joy. We will hold you; keep you, safe in this wonderful place…_"

"Thanks." Cale whispered, giving the ceiling a brief smile. He honestly had no idea where the TARDIS' "brain" was anyway…He shook himself out of his distraction and focused again on the Doctor's back. He frowned. The man was pacing and muttering to himself.

It seemed like he was in his own little world and had completely forgotten Cale even existed. Cale gave a rueful look to the air and shrugged, sighing softly. He crossed his arms sat there, staring down the bed at his scuffed buckle-boots. His pants were torn at the hems and his boots were so worn he was sure they'd fall apart tomorrow. His red shirt was faded and threadbare, going with his beige space pants. The clothes he had pilfered had been designer once upon a time, but now they were just old.

He sighed again and looked up from staring at his boots only to jump in fright when his eyes met the Doctor's face, inches from his own.

"Dammit! Don't _do_ that!" Cale shouted, heart once again pounding the tango against his rib cage. This had seemed to become a habit. "What, uh, why are you--"

"Sh!" The Doctor hissed at him, brown eyes boring into Cale's blue ones. He seemed to squint, tilt his head, then squint again. Suddenly, he pulled back, brown eyes wide and an expression of complete and utter shock on his face. "I don't _believe_ it! You're impossible! This is impossible! How could they--? What did the Time Agency _think_ they were doing? Did they even think at all? How could this happen? How could you happen, Cale? I don't understand!"

He started to pace rapidly back and forth at an impossible clip, both hands fisted in his longish hair. "I just _don't _believe it! This isn't happening, it isn't. I'm dreaming. That's it! I'm dreaming and you aren't here! The loneliness has finally driven me starkers, that's it!"

"You drove yourself starkers!" Cale angrily interrupted, shocking the Doctor into stillness and silence. "What do you mean I'm impossible? I'm sittin' right here, ain't I? Not impossible, then, obviously! And _what_ did the Time Agency do to me? Stop ramblin' and explain, dammit!"

"Did they create you in a laboratory?" The Doctor inquired, seemingly calm for the moment. "It's vital that you answer this, Cale. Did they create you?"

"I-I think so." Cale admitted softly. He sighed and rubbed his forehead. "I like to think different, that my parents are out there somewhere, but deep in I know that I never had any."

"Oh my God." The Doctor breathed, both hands on his face for a moment, before he slowly dragged them down. "I don't believe it. They grew you. They actually _grew_ you!"

"And that's a shock, why?" Cale demanded tightly. "It's the 51st century, people clone their dead pets, why not a human?"

"You aren't human, not completely anyway. They used human DNA, and if I had to guess, I would say about forty percent of you is human. The rest of you, though, the rest of you is…I just can't _believe_ it!"

"I'm not butter!" Cale growled, completely loosing his patience. "Stop repeatin' yourself like a broken A-B loop and tell me what the hell is goin' on! Now!"

"They were trying to create a Time Lord." The Doctor answered after a long, uncomfortable pause. He shook his head in wonder, an astonished smile playing at his lips. "And they succeeded, mostly. You're still human, but parts of you, parts of you aren't. They did it. They actually _did _it!"

"Whoa, wait, slow down for the special ED kids." Cale interrupted, confusion marring his features. "I'm a what? A Time Lord? Those don't exist." he swallowed. "Right?"

"Wrong!" The Doctor exclaimed, making Cale jump. He grinned manically, eye shining. "I'm a Time Lord, last of, or so I thought. And I wasn't, for a while, but then I was again, just a few weeks ago and…this is amazing! I thought the Master was it, but you, oh you, you're here and they made you and I can't believe it!"

"Great." Cale deadpanned. He sighed again, not completely understanding what was going on. "I know the stories, the legends, and with that knowledge, the question becomes, why create me? What help could I possibly be to the Time Agency?"

"You, my friend, were made for traveling through time." The Doctor informed him excitedly. His earlier misgivings seemed to have fluttered away with the breeze. "It will kill humans, eventually. Well, if you use the Vortex Manipulator, which is standard Time Agency issue. Some of their older Agents have lost their heads, literally. I think they made you in an attempt to get around that, and, I'd say it worked. Perfectly! Just enough human to do as you're told and enough Time Lord to keep all your insides in their pre-designed order. Brilliant!

"Cold, calculating, and somewhat horrid, but still brilliant!" The Doctor finished, his grin threatening to split his face in half.

"Oh, yeah, absolute genius." Cale said darkly, swinging his legs over the side of the bed and standing, arms crossed protectively across his chest. "They decided to 'test' me, you realize. To make sure I was 'up to snuff' as the old saying goes. Do you know how much that _hurts_? Oh, yeah, they were brilliant, alright. Brilliant sadists!"

"I'm sorry." The Doctor answered, mood going somber all of the sudden. "I'm so sorry, I didn't realize, Cale. I should have known, what with the scan and all. I'm sorry."

"It's okay." Cale gave him a weak smile. He shrugged. "Can't really be mad at you, anyway. You rescued me from their headquarters. That's where I was, ya know, lookin' for answers. Figured if they were anywhere, that's where they'd be."

"You're very brave." The Doctor told him with a comforting smile. "Not many would go back to that place after…"

"Yeah, well, I was never known for my self-preservation skills." Cale told him, embarrassment coloring his face. He cleared his throat. "Right, so, what next?"

"How would you like to see Earth?" The Doctor asked, eyes sparkling with genuine delight.

"Could we go to the 21st century?" Cale asked, the pain of the last bit of conversation buried under his excitement. It would sink in later anyway, when he had a chance to sit down and think.

"Yes, in fact," The Doctor said as he led Cale out of the Medbay and towards the main control room, "I need to make a pit stop and refuel. The old girl is almost out of juice."

"Where do you have to stop?" Cale inquired as they entered the main room. He walked over and grabbed his handle, knowing the ride was about to get crazy.

"Cardiff, Wales." The Doctor answered him with a smirk.

"_Going home to see Jack. One step now and he'll be back. You'll like him, little boy._"

"I hope so." Cale answered the air. "I really do."

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Okay, that was chapter one. Not to worry, those of you that know me, this story is finished. I'll be posting a chapter a day, and it's five chapters. So, you have something to read for a week. Hoorah! Now, review! And be honest. 


	2. He's a What? Wait!

DWT

"Owen!" Gwen's shout rang through the Hub, making Jack wince, and fight the urge to cover his ears. They were always doing this, he thought sullenly.

"It wasn't me this time, Gwen, I swear!" Owen shouted back, voice carrying through the metal and concrete. "Besides, I'm dead, I don't get out much."

"Oh, whatever." Gwen rolled her eyes, hands set on her hips. She seemed to be adjusting to married life quite well. Jack was sure her children would be well-behaved.

"It's not important now, anyway." Toshiko interrupted their argument. "There's been some recent rift activity out on--"

Before Tosh could finished her sentence, a loud grinding whine sounded in the Hub, followed quickly by the intruder alarms. Jack covered his ears, and tried to gesture at Ianto to turn off the alarms at the same time, and realized he couldn't do both with any efficiency at once. Regardless, Ianto seemed to understand what his wild hand motions meant, and disabled the alarm just as the blue police call box finished materializing in the middle of the Hub.

It was complete, and blessed silence for a few stunned moments, before the TARDIS doors were flung open and a man in a blue suit with a brown over coat stepped out, followed by a young teenager, with ratty brown pants and a faded red shirt. The boy had blue eyes and brown, shaggy, unkempt hair that sat in a wild mess atop his head, going down to just below his ears. He seemed to be taking everything in at once, with wide, curious eyes.

"Doctor!" Jack exclaimed, a smile on his face and genuine pleasure in his eyes. He rushed out of his office, down the steps and skidded to a halt in front of the new arrivals. "It's good to see you again."

"Likewise, Jack." The Doctor greeted with a grin. They shared a quick hug, then Jack turned to his team.

"Gwen, Ianto, Owen, Tosh, this is the Doctor." Jack introduced. He frowned, blue eyes settling on the teenager. "Uh…who's he?"

"Hi." the boy gave them a small half-wave. He stuffed his hands in his pockets and tried not to look as awkward as he felt.

"This," The Doctor started, "is Cale. Picked him up in the old Time Agency headquarters. Quite a find, too."

"You did what?" Jack demanded, stunned. "When, why, what the hell for?"

"You do have an office in this dungeon, right?" The Doctor interrupted Jack's would-be tirade. He smiled briefly over at the Torchwood team. "Was good to finally meet you, by the way. Jack talked about you a lot."

"You aren't leaving, are you?" Gwen asked the question that was burning painfully bright in everyone's minds.

"Who, me?" Jack asked. He smiled reassuringly at them. "No, I'm not leaving, Gwen. Maybe sometime in the future, but not now, I promise."

"Good enough for me." Owen said gruffly, though he was obviously just as relieved as everyone else. He didn't know how he'd cope with being dead without Jack. It suddenly seemed impossible.

"Right! Well. Office, Jack?" The Doctor interrupted their "team" moment. "I really, _really_ need to talk to you."

"Yeah, sure, this way." Jack led his two visitors up the winding concrete stairs to his office, ushered them in first, then firmly closed the door behind them.

Cale took up a spot by the wall, leaning against it and crossing his arms, trying to appear small, and thus invisible. Jack noticed this, and filed it away for later, more intent on hearing the news the Doctor so obviously had for him. It had to be important for him to suddenly rush over to Torchwood, considering his dubious relationship with the organization.

"So, what's so important you had to scare me and my team half-to-death to deliver it?" Jack prompted when he noticed the Doctor wasn't going to.

"I found something, Jack. Something so incredible I'm not even sure it's real." The Doctor answered, eyes seeming distant, not all there in the present. He suddenly snapped out of it and locked eyes with Jack. "I found another one, Jack, another Time Lord. Well, not completely a Time Lord, he's human, too, but still, I found one!"

"Who?" Jack asked, feeling like he was missing something so completely obvious that it was embarrassing.

"Cale, of course!" The Doctor exclaimed. "Why else would I bring him here? He's just a boy, after all."

"Whoa, wait, him?" Jack pointed to Cale, who had been examining a paper weight. The boy looked up sharply, a vaguely guilty expression on his young face. Jack's jaw dropped. "No way. No friggin' way! _That_ little slip of a kid? And how? I mean you said they were all destroyed, that everyone but you and the Master had died in the Time War."

"Time War?" Cale piped up, brow furrowed in thought. His jaw dropped. "That actually _happened_? Holy hell…" He shook himself back into the present. "Right. Um…are you from the 51st?"

"Yeah, I am." Jack answered, standing up a little straighter. He smiled. "It's good to meet someone else from my time, well, someone who isn't trying to kill me, anyway." He frowned. "How'd you guess?"

"I'd know that wrist strap anywhere, Agent." Cale replied, blue eyes like blocks of stone, and stance rigid. His fists clenched at his sides. His eyes never wavered from Jack as he spoke. "Doctor, I'd like to leave now."

"He won't hurt you, Cale." The Doctor told him, voice taking on a reassuring tone. He moved to stand in front of Cale and rested his hands on the boy's shoulders. "I promised, remember? Jack is a good man, he won't hurt you. The Time Agency hurt him, too, you know. Took two years of his memories."

Cale closed his eyes tightly, swallowed, then opened his eyes, visibly getting himself under control. He nodded jerkily at the Doctor, and the Time Lord took his hands off of the boy's shoulders. He moved away so Cale could see Jack once again. The Captain looked rather disturbed by the goings on, his right hand was gripping the desk so tightly his knuckles were white.

"Sorry." Cale apologized after taking a deep breath. "I didn't mean to accuse you, Mr…?"

"Harkness, Captain Jack Harkness." Jack answered, a tight smile on his face. He let go of the desk and shook his arm briefly to rid it of the tension. "So, you were at the Time Agency?"

"They built me." Cale responded, voice deceptively level. He could feel his emotions bubbling just under the surface, ready to explode. "They grew me in a tube like a clone. I'm their 'masterpiece'."

Jack could have been deaf, dumb and blind, but he still would have picked up on the venom in Cale's voice when he said the last word. Jack understood the boy, understood the feelings of hatred to some extent. He'd been angry enough at the Agency to feel that way, and he hadn't really felt any sympathy for them when John had told him the Agency had been destroyed. He'd only felt a strange sort of hollow satisfaction at the information.

Cale, though, had to live with every thing they had ever done to him. Jack knew what that entailed, knew what happened to those projects of the Agency. He'd discovered one, once--ow! He winced, and rubbed his head, pain flaring behind his eye lids, and setting his nerves on fire. He knew that pain. That was the pain that came with trying to remember a wiped memory. His eyes flew open and he studied Cale more closely, forcing his mind to remember.

_The hallway was brightly lit as he walked aimlessly down it. This is what happened when he drank too much coffee late at night. With a sigh, Jack crossed his arms and continued on his trek down the hall. If he walked far enough for long enough, the coffee would wear off eventually. _

_Suddenly, a scream pierced through the tranquil silence of the hallway. Jack felt his heart jump into his throat, and started off at a good clip towards the source. It had sounded like a child, a young child at that._

_What business did a little kid have in the Time Agency HQ anyways? _

_He stopped in front of an open door and his mind reeled in the abject horror of what his eyes saw. A boy, no older than four, strapped to a table, a yellow laser moving over his body, burning the skin, turning it raw and blistered. Oh God, he had to--_

"Ah!" Jack doubled over, clutching his head with one hand, and the other reaching out to hang onto the desk.

"Jack!" The Doctor rushed, over, hands hovering in the air, trying to decide where to touch his friend, not understanding what was happening.

"I'm okay." Jack forced out through clenched teeth. He blew out a breath and slowly stood, left hand still pressed to his forehead. He focused his eyes on Cale. "I know you. I saw you, when you were young. There was a laser--that's why they stole my memories!"

Cale gaped at him in shock. "I-I don't remember you."

"You wouldn't." Jack answered him, rubbing his forehead for the last time before dropping his hand to his side. "If they took my memories, they probably stole yours, too."

"Swell." Cale deadpanned, a closed expression on his face. "Another complaint to add to my growin' list of grievances. I oughta go find a judge, get me some hard cash."

"Wouldn't advise it." The Doctor spoke after he stopped fussing over Jack, making sure his friend was truly alright. He grinned at Cale. "Well, now we've managed to solve two different mysteries in under an hour. That's a record."

"Ha, yeah." Jack laughed his smile back. He shook his head in bewilderment. "I can always count on you to liven up my day, Doc."

"Oh, of course." The Doctor smiled back, the happy light back in his eyes.

"Jack!" The three of them turned to see Gwen burst into the office, a concerned expression on her face. "Jack, the Rift is spiking, we really need to go. Now!"

"Rift?" Cale asked, following Jack, the Doctor and Gwen as they rushed out of the office.

"Cardiff sits on the middle of a Rift in time and space." The Doctor explained. "That's why I stop here, in Cardiff, to charge the engines. The TARDIS can harness the excess energy coming off of the Rift and convert it into fuel."

"Right. Okay. And Rift activity means what, exactly?" Cale asked they came to a stop in front of a computer area. There were monitors and wires everywhere, and in the middle of it all was Tosh, sitting on a small rolling chair, rapidly moving back and forth from one screen to another.

"Rift activity means that something fell through." Jack answered tersely, focused on getting answers. "Tosh, Ianto, report!"

"Rift energies spiking down by the docks, Jack. Northeast corner, by the ocean." Ianto answered first, rushing into the room holding a clipboard and rapidly flipping pages.

"It started just as the TARDIS materialized in the Hub, Jack." Tosh told him, spinning around in her chair to look Jack in the eyes. "I think something followed him through."

"What, that's impossible!" The Doctor exclaimed, moving to look at the computer screens himself. He frowned, then his eyes went wide. "Apparently it isn't. She's right, Jack. Someone, or something, followed me through. Sorry."

"Shit." Cale said bluntly, fear curling like ice in his guts. "They're followin' me. They have to be."

"You don't know that, Cale. It could be me they're after." The Doctor quickly argued, not liking the look of fear in Cale's eyes. He hated seeing that look on anyone.

"The only way to travel in the same Time Stream as someone else is a Vortex Manipulator." Cale informed them in a monotone. His eyes were blank as they stared at one of Toshiko's computer screens. "The only people who have access to that technology are Time Agents, ex or not."

"Hold on, the people that Jack used to work for are after you?" Owen interrupted. He scoffed, disbelief written on his face. "What could they possibly want with _you_?"

"Long story." Jack derailed that line of questioning swiftly. "The good news is; we know it's just one person. Tosh, track the Rift signature, give me a location. Ianto, get the SUV. Gwen, Owen, gear up. We're goin' huntin'."

"What about us, Jack?" The Doctor gestured at himself and Cale. "If this Agent is after Cale…"

"We can't bring him with us." Jack told him firmly. He sighed and rubbed the back of his head. "Doctor, get in the TARDIS and take him as far away from here as you possibly can. We can't let them get him again."

"I see one fatal flaw in that plan!" Cale shouted in panic. He began to talk so fast it was difficult to understand him. "They followed the Doctor here the same way we're leavin'! We can't leave until you're in possession of the Agent's Vortex Manipulator. He/she/it will just follow us to the end of the universe if we don't capture them first!"

"He's got a point, Jack." The Doctor supported, brown eyes pleading for Jack to understand, to let him help.

"Dammit!" Jack cursed. He began to pace. "Okay, Doctor, you're with us. Cale, stay here with Tosh. Help her in anyway you can. I know you're good with technology. Tell her every detail of the Vortex Manipulator in case we need a quick fix to stop it."

"Okay." Cale nodded jerkily. He blew out a breath, then walked over and snagged the only other rolling chair in the area. He pulled it up next to Tosh and the two were quickly embroiled in a detailed technical discussion.

"Right." Jack muttered under his breath. "The rest of you with me! C'mon, we need to hurry, there's no telling how long he'll be in one place."

The Doctor grinned and followed after Jack, Owen and Gwen. "I always liked traveling in a car. Don't get to do it often enough, really."

DWT

The SUV was full, and everyone was strangely quiet, talking only when the need arose to give directions or ask questions. Jack thought it odd that the Doctor was so quiet, but then his entire visit was odd. He'd expected Martha to be there with him, but she wasn't. The Doctor had shown up with a runaway who was far more important than he looked. The boy was an invaluable advance in science, and a personal investment for the Doctor, truthfully.

If Cale survived, the Doctor wouldn't be alone.

It was honestly that simple. While Jack knew logically things could go to hell in a hand basket before he could blink, the other part of him wished that the trouble with Cale ended in the next hour. He knew it wouldn't, though. Knew it couldn't possibly end when they captured this Time Agent. Jack knew how they could be, knew how tenacious they were trained to be. He was the same way and he understood how this Agent they were after thought. He had been trained to do the same things, after all. If it was his mission, though, he would have had Cale by now.

The boy would be strapped to a table at this very moment, very well could be some point in the unforeseeable future. That was the trouble with time travel. You could be doing all of the work now only to imprison yourself in the future and bring about the very outcome you were trying to prevent. There was no telling what going after this particular Agent would do and there was no way to say for sure if the Agent was even after Cale. He could have just fallen through the Rift.

It was unlikely, but Jack wished with everything he had that that was the case. He didn't want to start a hunt. Not now, and not ever. He knew where it would lead with the Doctor in tow. Things would disintegrate into barely organized chaos within a matter of moments if he didn't keep a microscope close watch on everything happening. That was impossible, though; there were just too many factors to watch out for. He simply couldn't plan for everything and neither could the Doctor. He was reasonably sure that the two of them could keep things together, however.

Assuming they were both after the same outcome…

Jack didn't even want to _think_ about that little glitch.

"Brooding is most definitely not your color, Jack." The Doctor interrupted his inner musings, tossing him a sideways glance. His brown eyes implored Jack to listen. "This'll turn out alright, Jack. Always does in the end, anyway. You know that."

"It's how long it takes to get there that I'm worried about." Jack responded solemnly. He gestured with his left hand in the air. "I mean, it took us a year to get rid of the Master, then time reverted into itself. That won't happen here. We don't get a universal reset if the cosmic shit hits the fan."

"Oh, don't be so negative, Jack." The Doctor dismissed with a casual flap of his hand. He twisted around in his seat, right leg pulled up and resting in the middle seat. "Things'll be fine. We stop this Agent, and we'll be good, yeah?"

"No, we won't." Jack informed him bluntly, both hands gripping the wheel tightly. "If this Agent doesn't succeed, they send another, and another, and another until the mission is complete or they're out of Agents. If I knew what time this was, I'd know how many we would be up against. But I don't and neither do you. There's only one person that does and we can't get to him. I wouldn't anyway, even if the world was about to explode."

"I'll second that." Owen muttered from the backseat, shamelessly eavesdropping. "Bloody psycho, he was."

"Nobody asked you." Jack retorted, locking eyes with Owen in the rear view mirror.

"I agree with him." Ianto piped up from his middle seat in the back. He was squished between Gwen and Owen. "Owen, that is. And you, Jack. I wouldn't call Captain Hart if the world were ending, either."

"Who's Captain Hart?" the Doctor asked, looking completely lost. "When did you meet him?"

"Just after you dropped me home." Jack answered the Doctor, a smirk on his face. "He nearly killed my team, did kill me."

"I still wish the bastard had blown up." Gwen interjected, unable to resist.

"That would have been bad." Ianto told her with a frown. "You were handcuffed to him at the time."

"Oh, really?" The Doctor looked over the middle seat and into the back. "How did that happen?"

"He killed a woman for a diamond that didn't exist and tricked us into finding what he thought were pieces of a map leading to it. It turned out to be a bomb that locked onto the DNA of her killer. He would have blown Cardiff off the map if it wasn't for Jack and Owen's quick thinking." Gwen replied, not really bothered by this. Things stranger than that had happened to her in the course of the last six months to make that incident seem relatively tame.

"Wow. And here I thought your life was dull without me, Jack." The Doctor teased, smiling at his old friend. "Who'd've thought. But, I have to ask, why would he be the only one to know how many Time Agents existed and when?"

"He was there when they Agency fell. He was an Agent, and my partner. On our last mission together, we got caught in a two week time loop and ended up spending five years together, repeating the same two weeks." Jack answered, a rueful smile on his face. "I'd thought it was heaven then. Now, I fondly remember it as absolute hell.

"Anyway, when he met up with me a few months ago, he told me the Agency was destroyed and that there was only seven Agents left. I'm assuming this is several years after you found Cale. Hell, for all we know, we could be the reason there's only seven agents left." Jack finished his report with a shrug, then turned onto a side street. It was the quickest way to the docks that he knew of.

"Could be." The Doctor nonchalantly agreed. "Hmm." He gave Jack a wry look. "Well, can't say I feel sorry for them after what they did to Cale, though. And after what they did to you. And to countless others, I'm sure."

"Me too." Jack agreed strongly, eyes focused on the road. He took a deep breath to calm himself down. The last thing he needed was to go rushing into the up coming situation angry and not thinking straight. That would just get someone killed.

"_Jack, you're coming up on his position, two hundred yards to your left._" Tosh's voice cut into their conversation, the grainy sound of the comms distorting it slightly.

"Two hundred to my left?" Jack looked out of the passenger side window and frowned. It was a maze of warehouses. They weren't quite to the docks, the Agent must have moved, and judging by the direction, he was headed towards the Hub. Undoubtedly, he was tracking the emissions from the TARDIS. Clever man.

Jack pressed down on the brake, slowing the SUV to a stop on the side of the road. He put it in park and turned to his team. "Well, this is it. Let's end this today. I don't want to be chasing Agents around Cardiff for the next to weeks."

"Me either." Ianto emphatically agreed. He looked over at Gwen. "Now would be a good time to open the door, Gwen."

"You've been hanging around with Jack for far too long, Ianto." Gwen grumbled as she opened the door and climbed out of the SUV.

"Thank you." Ianto cheekily replied, climbing out of the car after her. He pulled his PDA out of his waist clip. The Rift signal was beeping straight ahead. "One hundred yards across the road, Jack."

"Swell." Jack answered, fixing his sunglasses in place against the bright midday sunlight. It was a change, usually the insanity happened at night in Cardiff.

"Well, at least we don't have to search every nook and cranny." The Doctor pointed out, squinting against the sun. "Right, lead the way, Jack."

"Just out of curiosity," Owen began to ask after they had safely crossed the street, "what exactly do you plan to do to help out, Doctor?"

"Keep him from running away." Was the Doctor's ambiguous reply.

Jack smirked and gave a soft chuckle. "Just tell me how long I need to hold him down. I doubt he'll be as cooperative as I was about it, Doc."

"No, he probably won't, will he?" The Doctor mused absently, eyes scanning the grungy alley for their target. It was going to be hard to find him in this maze of warehouses. "Oh, well, we'll figure it out as we go along. I work best that way, anyhow."

"Tell me about it." Jack muttered darkly. He glanced over at Ianto. "Where is he now, Ianto?"

"Inside the building on the right." Ianto answered. He pointed towards an old, rusted aluminum door. "We can get in through there."

"Right." Gwen jogged up and pulled on the handle. The door didn't budge. "Dammit! It's locked, Jack. Now what?"

"Let me handle this." The Doctor withdrew his sonic-screwdriver from the inside pocket of his coat and pointed it at the lock. A buzz, a blue light, and a whir later, the lock was picked and the door was opened. He turned to Jack's team, a triumphant grin on his face. "Sonic-screwdriver, opens anything. Well, expect for a deadlock seal, but I don't think we'll be running into any of those any time soon. At least, I don't think. Well, you never--"

"We get it." Jack interrupted the Doctor's ramble with a fond smile. He pulled his gun and took up a position by the door. "Gwen."

"On it, Jack." She drew her gun and Ianto and Owen quickly followed suit.

"Oh, c'mon, Jack, you're not gonna shoot him, are you?" The Doctor sounded for all the world like a put out child.

"If I have to." Jack tersely replied. "I'm not taking any chances with this. Doing things your way leads to chaos nine times outta ten. We can't afford that this time, Doc. I'm sorry. Now, step back."

The Doctor did as told for once and Jack took in a deep breath, readjusting his grip on his gun and shifting his weight. "Okay, on three. One. Two. Three!"

He yanked open the door with more force than strictly necessary and Gwen and Ianto rushed in, guns held at the ready. Owen stayed back, facing the alley and covering them from behind. The Doctor and Jack rushed in after Gwen and Ianto, eyes wide and hurriedly scanning for threats. They shared a look, and Jack moved ahead of his team, leaving the Doctor in the back with Gwen.

"Watch the door, Owen. It's our only way out." Jack called over his shoulder. Owen raised his hand in reply, but was otherwise silent. Jack was nervous about leaving the young man there, he couldn't heal back if the Time Agent decided to attack and break some more bones.

"Right, Mr. Jones, where is our time-traveling friend at now?" The Doctor asked, sonic-screwdriver held at the ready.

"Just ahead." Ianto answered softly, eyes shifting from his PDA to the air, and back. He couldn't decide which one to focus on permanently.

"Why can't we see him?" Gwen asked, voice pitched low as to not alert the Agent they were there.

"I dunno." The Doctor replied in a stage whisper. He sighed and turned to Jack. "What do you think, Jack?"

"He's here. He's got to be." Jack answered. He growled under is breath and angrily tapped his comm. "Tosh, are you sure-"

"Look out!" Ianto's warning almost came too late.

Jack noticed the thing jumping from the high steel I-beams and heading straight for the Doctor in the nick of time. He dived at his friend, knocking them both to the floor and out of the way of the plummeting alien. Jack rolled over onto his feet and drew his gun in one motion. He leveled it between the Time Agent's eyes. The Agent's skin was deep purple, almost black. It had two small three inch horns where its ears should be on its very oval shaped head. Its hands were bony and gnarled, gripping its sonic-blaster tightly in them.

Jack and the uniformed alien stared at each other, blue eyes locked with sickly pale yellow. The thing's uniform was worn, the pants torn at the knees and the red Agency jacket, grungy and in need of a wash. The alien looked just as worn around the edges as Cale, but Jack knew different. His eyes briefly noted the Agent's wrist strap on its left wrist. That's what he had to get at and judging by the murderous resolve in the Agent's eyes, it was going to be one hell of a fight.

"Well, we're all here now, aren't we?" The thing's voice was low and gravely, issued from a mouthful of razor sharp teeth. "Where's life form 19769-01?"

"I'm sorry, who?" The Doctor interjected himself into the situation effortlessly. He frowned. "And, furthermore, what's a Braeken doing in the Time Agency? I thought you lot were peaceful."

The last question was thusly ignored by the Agent. "You know who I'm looking for! The boy, where is he?"

"Stand down." Jack ordered tersely, blue eyes hard as steel, glittering with the silent threat of pain in the dim light of the warehouse.

"Where is life form 19769-01!" The Braeken shouted loudly, voice rising enough to make everyone wince and fight not to cover their ears. Its yellow eyes narrowed dangerously. "You will tell me, _Jack Harkness_! I know you have it!"

"He isn't an it!" The Doctor exclaimed angrily, sonic-screwdriver pointed at the alien's gun. "He's a boy, a child! Leave him alone! He's done nothing to you, or your Agency."

"Where is 19769-01?" The Braeken demanded tightly, gun never wavering from its aim on Jack's forehead.

"Where you'll never find him." Jack informed him with deadly calm. "Now, hand over your weapon or I'll shoot."

"Jack!" The Doctor glared at him. "Honestly!"

"Life form 19769-01!" The alien was rapidly heading towards hysterical as the realization set in that he wasn't getting out of this particular situation. Three guns and a sonic-screwdriver pointed in his direction was enough to convince him of that fact. "You _will_ hand him over to me! _Now_!"

"No." Jack said bluntly. "You have three seconds to stand down. Three. Two. One."

"No! Jack, don't!" The Doctor shouted just as Jack pulled the trigger.

An echoing shot rang out through the warehouse, vibrating the walls and overloading everyone's ear drums. The back of the alien's head exploded, and he collapsed back onto the cold, unforgiving concrete, black, viscous blood leaking out to redecorate the bland, gray floor. It was complete silence, the only round was the ringing in their ears from the gunshot. Jack slowly lowered his weapon, keeping it ready just incase he needed to fire again. His mind was thankfully blank as he stared at the corpse on the floor.

"Why did you do that?" The Doctor stepped in front of him, brown eyes blazing with righteous anger. His fists were clenched at his sides as he glared heatedly at Jack. "You didn't have to _kill _him, Jack! I could've--"

"What, negotiated?" Jack demanded harshly, finally holstering his weapon. Gwen and Ianto slowly followed, both of them stunned into silence.

"What happened?" Owen asked breathlessly as he skidded to a stop by his teammates. He looked from the dead alien, to the Doctor, eyes finally settling on Jack. "You shot him?"

"Yes." Gwen answered for Jack, who seemed to be in a staring contest with the Doctor.

"Yeah, Jack, I could've gotten him to-"

"To what, Doctor?" Jack snapped, all of his patience fleeing. "He wasn't going to back down, no matter _what_ we did! I trained with him, I know! And don't for a second _think_ that I _wanted_ to do that, because I didn't!"

"Then why did you, Jack?" The Doctor asked calmly, all the fight leaving his countenance. He just looked _tired_ now.

"Because I'm the one who makes the hard decisions." Jack responded just as calmly, his ire tightly controlled. He took a deep breath and released it, flexing his shoulders, trying in vain to banish the tension. "Right, Owen, Ianto, start the clean up."

Jack reached down and took the Braeken's wrist strap. He fingered the Vortex Manipulator for a moment before tossing it harshly at the Doctor. The Time Lord caught it just before the small device impacted painfully with his face. He glared at Jack, hostility positively radiating off of him in waves. Jack just ignored it as best he could and stalked back towards the SUV. He knew this wasn't going to be the end of it, not by a long shot. That didn't really matter now, though. He needed to get back to the Hub and check on things, make sure Tosh and Cale were alright.

"_Jack!_" Tosh's panic shout sliced through his mind like a laser, setting of a race of panic that settled in his chest. "_Jack, they found us! Quick, you have to--no! Don't! I'm armed! Leave him, take me! Cale! Jack, you have too-_"

The transmission abruptly cut out, leaving Jack with a blinding worry and a feeling of impotency stronger than any he'd ever felt. "Tosh! Tosh, come in! Toshiko! Tosh! Talk to me, Tosh! Tosh!"

"What's happened?" The Doctor demanded, worry emanating from his eyes. "Jack, what's happened? What happened to Toshiko and Cale? Jack! Tell me they didn't get them, Jack! Jack, tell me!"

"I can't!" Jack shouted, sprinting towards the car. He stopped suddenly, the Doctor nearly running into his back. "I can't tell you anything! I should have seen this, dammit!"

"You aren't clairvoyant!" Ianto returned, grabbing Jack's arm. He dragged him towards the car, his own terror blindingly apparent. "Now is not the time to argue! We need to get back to the Hub, now! Run, Jack!"


	3. Plans and Hostages

OKay, folks, here's chappie number three. Review! I really want to know what you guys think of this story. I wanna know I'm not just posting for the server ghosts.

* * *

DWT

The Doctor sprinted into the Hub, squeezing through the gap in the main entrance. He skidded to a stop near the computers and his jaw dropped.

It was a complete disaster.

Paper, parts, pieces, wiring, metal and random debris were everywhere. Almost half of the computer screens had been completely demolished and the others were either dented or covered in mess. The rolling chairs were tipped over and one had a blaster hole in the seat back. The Doctor swallowed past the lump in his throat, frozen to the spot. Scorch marks marred the walls and computer stands. Two CPU towers were lying on the floor, parts scattered across the concrete.

One tower had a smear of blood on it.

The Doctor felt is panic increase, and he rushed over to the smear, pulling his sonic-screwdriver from his pocket. He scanned the sample and gasped, pain spreading through his chest. It was Cale's blood. He'd been hit, shot, hurt. The Agent had gotten him and there was nothing to be done about it, not a single bloody thing. He felt rage welling up in him, hot and burning brighter than a star. He welcomed it, knew he would need it.

Jaw clenched tightly, he stood from his crouch and turned to face Jack. His brown eyes seemed to be on fire with determination and anger.

"I'm gonna get him back, Jack." the Doctor informed him, voice colder than ice. "And I'm gonna destroy anyone that gets in my way. I'm though with this! _Through_ with it! No more, Jack. Not one more person _ever_ again!"

Jack walked over to his friend, gingerly navigating his way through the debris. He looked the Doctor calmly in the eyes, his own just as fiery. "Tell me what to do."

"Track the signal." The Doctor ordered, springing into action. "I want to know where and when they've gone and I want to know now."

"How are we gonna get there?" Gwen demanded, looking distressed. "We can't just _drive_!"

"Ah, but you forget." The Doctor turned to her, a manic light in his eyes and a dangerous, wide grin on his face. "I'm a Time Lord and I have a TARDIS. We'll chase them the same way they chased us. Grab what you need and be quick about it; we don't have a lot of time!"

"Dallen IV, year 5178!" Jack called out, looking up from his Vortex Manipulator and the Braeken's. "City in the northern hemisphere, Rictor's Haven!" His grin was feral. "This time, they _aren't_ gonna win!"

"Damn straight." The Doctor said firmly. He opened the doors of the TARDIS. "Everyone in, it's gonna be a bumpy ride, ladies and gents!"

"I can't believe I'm doin' this." Owen muttered under his breath as he walked into the TARDIS.

"Believe it." Ianto told him as the Doctor closed the doors after Jack and Gwen. "We're about to travel to another planet in the future."

"Oh my God." Gwen breathed, coming to stand next to Ianto and Owen. She gave the TARDIS a once over. "Is this really happening?"

"Apparently." Ianto responded dryly, grabbing a hold of the handle on the ramp. "I think we'd better hold on."

Gwen, Owen and Ianto watched in detached fascination as Jack and the Doctor rushed about, flipping switches, arguing and generally getting the TARDIS off of the ground. It all seemed like random chaos to the Torchwood team, but they had long since learned to trust Jack, and by extension now, the Doctor. It's not like they had much of a choice at the moment anyway. The only way to get Toshiko back was to go there and get her, and the only way to do that was through the Doctor's TARDIS.

Suddenly, a loud, familiar whine filled the cabin and they knew it was time to go. The TARDIS began to shake and groan, the Doctor and Jack shouting over the cacophony of sounds. It was organized chaos for a few tense moments before an abrupt silence filled the spacious room. Gwen looked down at her hands and pried them off of the ramp bar, wincing at the pain. She had been gripping the railing harder than she had thought.

"Wow." Owen mumbled. He shook off his own nervousness and cautiously approached the main console in the middle of the room, admiring the aqua blue glow. "That was bloody brilliant."

"I'll second that." Ianto said, wonder written plainly on his face.

"We there?" Jack asked the Doctor, hope shining from his eyes.

"The TARDIS wouldn't mess up with something like this, Jack." The Doctor answered him, only mildly offended. He blew out a breath, then clapped his hands. "Right, everybody out! We have a rescue to undertake." He walked over to the doors, then paused. He turned around and looked Jack square in the eyes. "No more killing."

"But-"

"Promise me, Jack." The Doctor stubbornly insisted. "Or I won't let you come with us."

"Alright." Jack conceded reluctantly. "But that doesn't mean I won't shoot them."

"Never said you couldn't." The Doctor acknowledged. "Just don't kill them. Shoot them wherever you like otherwise."

"I like that policy." Owen interjected, a smirk hovering around his lips. "They took Tosh. I want her back. And I don't care what I have to do to achieve that."

"None of us do." Ianto realized softly. He locked eyes with the Doctor. "Let's go. We're wasting time standing here talking."

"Yes, quite right!" The Doctor tossed them a wide grin, then flung open the doors.

The sight before their eyes was rather anti-climatic. Instead of a brilliant, shining cityscape, all they wound up with was a foggy look at a few towering skyscrapers and copious amounts of rain. What should have been shining and awe inspiring was rusted and in the process of decaying around them. It looked like a third world country that had, once upon a time, been a great nation. Things had gone into disrepair as the city's wealth had unarguably dropped. It looked like no one cared how broken, witheredand disgusting their great pillar of civilization had become.

"Well, that's a pity." The Doctor remarked sadly as they filed out of the TARDIS. Jack firmly closed and locked the doors behind them. "This place used to be beautiful and new. Or, at least it was the last time I was here."

"It's always been like this." Jack told him cheerlessly. He shrugged off the depression of seeing the city and walked down a decrepit, rusting ramp. "C'mon, we have hostages to find."

DWT

"Get off of me!" Toshiko shrieked, twisting her body and throwing her weight around in an attempt to free herself from the iron grip of her captor.

It wasn't much use.

"Stop struggling!" The red-scaled alien hissed at her, brown eyes glittering threateningly. He squeezed her arm tighter, bruising it almost immediately.

"No!" Tosh yelled at him, swinging her elbow back into the alien's ribs. It grunted, but only held on even tighter and pressed a blaster roughly against her temple, stilling her instantly. "Alright! Alright, I'll stop. Just don't shoot."

"Good girl." The thing snarled at her.

Tosh rolled her eyes and turned her head, catching a look at Cale. The boy was walking calm as you please next to a green skinned human being. The discolored human had a strong grip on the scruff of Cale's neck, but the boy seemed oblivious to everything around him. His blue eyes were glazed and distant, as if his mind was somewhere else entirely. For all Tosh knew, it could have been. He was unnervingly compliant, even his captor seemed disturbed by his haunting silence.

"Cale?" Tosh called softly, trying to communicate with the detached boy.

"Shut up!" Her kidnapper twisted her arm to emphasize his point.

Tosh kept quiet.

They walked down a damp metal hallway, veins of rust lining the walls and floor. Toshiko was sure if she fell her hands and knees would be scrapped up and bleeding for days. Their steps echoed with a daunting metallic clang that added a sense of finality to the situation. She and a teenage boy were being held against their will by aliens on another planet in the future. She had no idea in hell how they were going to get out of this or how Jack was going to get them out of it. It seemed impossible to hope for a rescue three thousand years into the future and over one hundred thousand light-years from Earth.

Those were insurmountable odds if she ever saw any.

No amount of mathematics in the world could save her now. Her computers were smashed, her laptop confiscated along with Cale's blaster.All she had was her brain and a traumatized child. Not a whole lot to work with if she looked at the situation logically, like she had been taught in her many years of collegiate study. Of course, the professors hadn't covered alien abduction. She winced. Damn, now she was a statistic of the lunatic fringe on the internet. Next thing she knew, she'd be an avid fan of the X-Files. Yeah, right, when pigs started to fly. Although, living in Cardiff that was a definite possibility…

Okay, Tosh, stop. She ordered herself sternly. No need to get yourself all worked up over this. You're Torchwood. You can get yourself and Cale out of this mess without dying. You were trained too. Just think, Toshiko, think!

Suddenly, her captor yanked her to a stop and knocked her out of her panicked thoughts. She looked up and frowned. They were standing in front of an old, rusted automatic door. The control panel on the left was barely lit attesting to the fact that the batteries had almost run out. Either that, or the planet barely had an electricity, which she doubted. It was three thousand years in the future; they used environmentally safe batteries by then, right?

The door opened with a high-pitched hiss, making Tosh wish her hands were free to cover her ears. The inside of the cell was dimly lit by a dying yellow light and it seemed to be just as damp as the hallway. It was covered in rust and the floor looked completely rough, like a giant sheet of sandpaper. Probably had the same effect on human skin, she was sure.

"Get in!" The alien roughly flung her into the cell, and Tosh barely stopped herself from falling on the sharp, rust-covered floor.

The green colored human merely nudged Cale and he walked inside, turning around to watch with dispassionate eyes as the aliens sneered at them. He didn't even blink, just stared straight ahead, seemingly unaffected by their current situation. In that moment, Tosh envied him immensely.

"Say good night, kiddies." The red-scaled alien sneered at them. The last sight they had was of the two hideously twisted faces as the door hissed painfully shut.

"Great. Just great." Tosh grumbled to herself as she began to pace. She stopped, sighed, then crossed her arms, wishing she had thought to wear a coat to work today. At least she had worn jeans and boots instead of a suit.

"So, what are we going to do?" She asked the unresponsive teenager. When he didn't react, she tried again, louder this time. "Cale. Cale! What are we going to do?"

"Huh?" Cale snapped out of his daze and spun around, seeming to just realize exactly what was going on. He frowned, did a quick once over of the cell, then turned back to Toshiko. "What did you say, again?"

"What are we going to do?" Tosh repeated slowly, slightly agitated that she had to ask the question for a third time.

"How should I know?" Cale asked her, bewildered. "I'm a teenager and you're a trained member of an alien fightin' squad, from what I gather. Isn't this supposed to be your department?"

"If we were on Earth, I'd have us out of here by now." Tosh acknowledged, walking slowly along the walls of their small cell. It was about fifteen feet by sixteen feet. Not all that big, but not so cramped as to make you panic. "Sadly, this isn't Earth. You were born in this century. What do you know about this technology? Is there a way to access the door controls from the inside?"

"No." Cale blew out on a harsh breath. His hands fisted in his shaggy hair for a moment, before letting go. "I-I don't--I'm not some genius. I have no _idea_ how to get us outta here! I don't think I'm gonna get out, anyway."

"What do you mean?" Tosh stopped her circuit of the cell to eye the boy. His shoulders were slumped and he seemed resigned to something that Tosh couldn't place.

"They have me again." Cale answered, eyes fixed on an invisible point on the wall. He seemed to be looking through it almost. "I can't get away; they own me from the grave. I won't get out of here, not this time, not again. It's impossible; I don't know why I thought different."

"Again? What do you mean again?" Tosh covered the small distance across the cell to stand next to Cale, facing the door.

"I was a 'guest' of the Time Agency before." Cale answered, voice sounding far off and empty. "That's why they captured you, they wanted me. They hurt, and maim, and torture until you're nothin' but a shell. I can't survive that again, I won't survive it again. I'm not gettin' outta here."

"Don't say things like that!" Tosh told him with more force than she intended. "We're _both_ getting out of here. Jack will come for us, you'll see. He always does. Just you watch, Cale."

"It's not the rescue I'm worried about." Cale informed her, finally looking Tosh in the eyes. She gasped at the blank, empty blue orbs that shone from his face. "It's the lastin' until it arrives that scares me. I won't make it. I'm broken, Tosh, and now, they're just gonna shatter me more."

For once, Tosh felt the stirrings of, real, un-tempered terror rising up within her. Her throat got tight, and her heart beat a punishing rhythm in her chest. This was it. She was a captive of futuristic sadists who got off on torturing grade-schoolers. And there wasn't a damn thing she could do about it.

* * *

Well, end of chapter three. C'mon, review! Ya know ya wanna. Be nice. Please? (insert pathetic puppy look here) 


	4. Metal Airvents and Green Cabbies

Riiight. Cahppie number four. Have fun, y'all. And don't forget to tell me what ya think.

* * *

DWT

"This is gonna take too long." Jack said with a sigh. He stopped in the middle of the nearly empty side walk and glanced out at the "road". Cars of all sorts flew by, and a few he recognized as a taxi. If they could pin point where they needed to go…

"I suddenly just realized that." The Doctor said, a strange expression on his face. He frowned, looking frustrated. "What else can we do? There has to be a faster way of getting there! And we don't even know where 'there' is, anyway."

"We used too." Ianto held up his PDA. The light wasn't flashing on the screen, but was still showing a map of the Cardiff docks. He shrugged and handed it to the Doctor. "Maybe you and Jack can figure out a way to make this work again."

"Ianto, you're brilliant!" The Doctor exclaimed, pulling out his sonic-screwdriver and getting to work. He seemed to come back to life in that very moment. "Jack, lemme see you're Vortex Manipulator, I need to tie the PDA into its signature detector and download a city map from the satellites that are no doubt floating above our heads as we speak."

Jack promptly extended his wrist towards the Doctor. "Have at it, Doc." He looked over at the road and suddenly grinned. He turned his head to look at Owen, a mischievous expression on his face. "Owen, flag us a cab."

"With pleasure." Owen responded, an equally disturbing smirk on his face. He walked over to the edge over the road and out onto a small platform that protruded from the sidewalk. Gathering his courage, he raised his hand and waived down the first brightly yellow painted car that flew by. 

"I can't believe I'm doin' this." He muttered to himself as the cabbie flew his car over to Owen. "I'm on an alien planet flaggin' down a cab like it was a Saturday afternoon."

"Aha!" The Doctor exclaimed, trademark triumphant grin back in place. He held up the PDA screen for all to see. "I found them!"

"Great!" The cabbie shouted as his window and door seemed to vaporize into thin air. "Now either get inside, or go the hell away. There's plenty more money to be had then you gaggle of loons."

"I thought it was 'gaggle of goons'?" The Doctor asked as he climbed into the cab behind a grumbling Gwen.

"What the hell planet are you from, doxy boy?" The cabbie snapped rudely as he rematerialized the door. The cab was, cramped, the seats were lumpy and awful, and the entire thing smelled vaguely of some sort of alien weed. 

"Someplace a long time ago in a galaxy, far, far away." The Doctor cryptically replied, a secretive smirk on his face. He turned to Jack and his team, eyes glowing excitedly. "I always wanted to say that."

"Great, kudos for you, doxy." The cabbie once again rudely interrupted. "Now say the thing we've all been wantin' to hear. Where to, ya kook?"

"Uh…" Jack snatched the PDA from the Doctor. "554365 Ackrun Street, level six."

"'Bout bloody time." The cabbie muttered darkly, slamming the cab into gear and throwing everyone back against their seats with the force of take off. He sneered at them in the rearview mirror. "Oh, sorry, bit bumpy at the start."

"Gee, ya think?" Gwen demanded angrily, rubbing the side of her head that had impacted with the dirty window. "That hurt."

"Tell me about it." Owen complained. He sighed, mourning the loss of his breath for a brief moment. "Imagine if I had broken somethin'."

"Lord, don't even joke, Owen." Gwen admonished, a brief look of fear in her eyes.

"Maybe you should have stayed." Ianto finally brought up the question Gwen and Owen had been burning to ask Jack. 

"The hell I should've!" Owen shot back hotly, eyes flashing. "There's nothin' that could've kept me from bein' here, tea boy."

"No need to be nasty!" The Doctor interrupted, tired of insults being hurled about willy-nilly. The green-skinned cabbie was enough for all five of them. "I have to ask, though, why shouldn't he be here? He seems perfectly healthy to me, if a little pale."

"I'm dead." Owen told him bluntly, face blank. "My body is dead, but somehow I'm still walkin' around like I was never shot through the heart."

"What?" The Doctor's eyes bulged and his jaw dropped. "But that's-you're-I can't-how can you be dead? You're sitting here talking, _moving_. How are you dead?"

"I brought him back." Jack admitted, shifting awkwardly in his seat. 

"You did _what_?" The Doctor twisted in his seat to look at Jack properly. 

"I used an ancient glove that fell through the Rift to bring him back for what I thought was two minutes. Guess we've sort of passed that milestone." Jack answered, looking for all the world like a guilty child. 

"What? Jack!" The Doctor gave a put upon sigh and briefly rubbed his forehead. He fixed Jack with a sharp look. "Do you have any idea what could have happened? Honestly, Jack! Think about it!"

"I did!" Jack snapped back, getting angry. "I thought about it, and this is the decision I made. Yeah, so maybe it wasn't the right one, but that's neither here nor there now, is it? What's done is done, Doctor."

The Doctor was silent, but his disapproval radiated throughout the small, grubby backseat of the alien cab. Owen was also glowering at Jack, more for bringing up the topic of his not-so-permanent demise than anything else. Strangely, as much as he wished an alien would break into the car and blow his undead head off, he really didn't want to die just yet. But, then again, who honestly did? Even Jack, for all he professed, wasn't ready to die yet. He would have been hounding the Doctor for answers to his immortality if he really wanted to permanently expire. Owen understood perfectly now. 

"Well, you're a cheery lot." The cabbie sniped from the driver's seat in the middle of the front. 

"Oh, do shut up!" Ianto barked at him, finally catching enough of the insults. "Your pay depends on how well you can keep silent."

The cabbie was blessedly silent after this pronouncement. Ianto grinned triumphantly to himself for a moment, before focusing on his teammates. "How are we gonna rescue Tosh and Cale? We need a plan before we arrive or all of this will have been for nothing."

"I can't think of a concrete plan until we see the building they're in." Jack answered agitatedly. He blew out a breath and rubbed the back of his head. "Right. Okay. Owen, I need you to be our eyes and ears. They're leakin' Rift energy and so are we. When we get there it'll be easy to watch the activity from Ianto's PDA."

"Why can't I go in?" Owen interrupted, indigence painted clearly on his face. "I want to go in. Tosh is my friend, too, Jack."

"You're dead, Owen." Jack told him, patience balancing on a torn tether. "You won't heal back if you get hurt. I won't risk it. Ianto, you and Gwen will go around the back and try to find another way in. If you can't get in the back, follow the Doctor and I through the front."

"We're goin' in the front door?" The Doctor sent Jack a quizzical look. "I don't remember that plan ever working very well."

"They'll let me in." Jack told them, eyes hard. He held up his wrist. "This guarantees me access. I can use the Doctor as an alien hostage. They'll figure out who I am eventually, but we'll be long gone by then, Toshiko and Cale in tow."

"I've seen this movie." Gwen put in her two cents worth. "This plan _never _works, Jack. There has to be a better way."

"Maybe there is." Jack relented, gesturing with his hands. "But I don't know what it is at the moment. Maybe, we'll figure somethin' else when we get there, but for now, this is how we're gonna do this."

"Alright." Ianto answered for all of them. He smiled softly. "Things always seem to go better when we trust you anyway, Jack. I think it's about time we learned."

DWT

Cale pulled his knees tighter to his chest, locking his hands over his skins. He didn't want to be here. The urge to charge screaming at the door to the cell was going to drive him insane before their rescue ever materialized. He clenched his jaw and pressed back against the rough, rust covered wall. He could feel his thin shirt rip and the sharp points of rust dig into his back, but he didn't care. The pain was minor compared to what was running through his head in HD surround sound. 

_White covered faces, sneering eyes. He could hear the promised agony screaming to him…_

No!

Not thinking that, he ordered himself harshly, breathing picking up with his sense of fear. Can't think that, can't loose to them, not now. Have to be strong, have to be. Got no choice, gotta fight. Lives depend, Cale, he told himself, eyes clenched shut, then forced open to fight the flashing images, the haunting whisper of pain. He could see it their eyes, the things they wanted to do to him. They wanted to watch his mind shatter in real time and record his screams to warm their ears at night. It was all music, art to them, he knew it was. Why else destroy him so thoroughly that he was useless to everyone around him?

"Cale?" His head snapped up, banging against the wall painfully, but he ignored that too. His frightened blue eyes landed on Tosh, taking in her concern and filing it away in his mind. 

"Cale, are you alright?" Tosh knelt down in front of him, brown eyes projecting her concern. "Are you here with me, or somewhere else? Cale?"

"I-I'm here." He answered, drawing in a shaky breath. He forced himself in control, ruthlessly squashing his emotions. If they could do it, so could he. "I'm here." 

He swallowed hard and pushed to his feet, Tosh copying his action. He drew in another breath and squared his shoulders, trying to appear more confident than he actually felt. "Right. So. Gettin' out. Yeah. Uh…dammit! I don't have a clue!"

"Calm down." Toshiko ordered, making eye contact. "We can't think if you loose your head. Focus and help me get us out of here, Cale. Can you do that?"

"Yeah, yeah, I can." Cale answered her, nodding jerkily. His hands fisted in his hair as he paced the small area of the cell. "I know of a hundred different ways to get outta here, the only problem is, we have nothin'. There's nothin' in here besides rust. No tools, no pieces of scrap, nothin'. I can't work miracles with air and neither can you, I'm assumin'."

"You'd be right." Tosh acknowledged ruefully. She walked over to the door, running her hands along the edges. "I don't think it's air tight, otherwise we would be dead by now."

"No, it is air tight." Cale corrected. He pointed at the ceiling. "That vent is six inches by six inches. Only a toddler could possibly get through even _if_ we managed to somehow reach the ceiling three feet above our heads."

"Does this control panel operate the door from the inside?" Tosh asked, the beginnings of a plan forming behind her eyes. 

"Well, the buttons don't work, but you could access the circuitry." Cale told her with a shrug. "Don't see how that helps us, though. You can't pry it open with your bare hands, the seal is too tight. You'd need some sort of leverage."

"I think I know where we can get it." Tosh said, eyes sparkling with hope. 

"Holy hell!" Cale exclaimed, understanding dawning in his mind. He smirked. "Who weighs more, you or me? And, who's stronger?"

"You're fourteen?" Tosh asked. Cale nodded. "Great, you hold me. I'd lay money on you being stronger than I am."

Cale nodded eyes distant for a moment as if he was calculating the truth of her statement. He looked up at her and smiled briefly. "I'd bet on it too. Okay, time to work the mechanics of breakin' a metal air vent."

* * *

Okie dokie, end of chappie four. Tell me what ya think, please. Review!


	5. Damsels Saved and Minds Remade

Okay, here's the end of my story. Please, read and review!

* * *

DWT

"We're here, ladies." The cabbie told them gruffly after they had recovered from the harsh and sudden stop. 

"Swell." Jack muttered under his breath, briefly rubbing his shoulder which had slammed into the hard side of the cab's interior. He violently punched the round blue button to open the cab door and stepped out, eyes surveying their new surroundings. 

"Well, that was charming." The Doctor remarked sarcastically, climbing out of the dirty, smelly, cramped alien cab after Jack. 

The rest of the team followed, each one of them grumbling under their breaths, cursing the cabbie, his cab and horrid driving skills. It was worse than rush hour London. Gwen pulled at the hems of her blouse, straightening out the wrinkles and brushing off some sort of unnamed residue from the cab seat. She didn't even want to contemplate what it could possibly be, considering where it had come from. Blinking against the change of light, Gwen focused her eyes on the warehouse just a few hundred yards in front of them. 

Like everything else on the planet, it was covered in a grotesque layer of orange rust and seemed to be falling apart at the seams. The sign above the small aluminum door was old and faded, covered in unclassifiable grunge. The only letters that remained legible were and "R" and an "O". She had no idea what the place used to be, but she was sure it was much more important than it was now. It looked to have been a mighty factory, a birth place of industry. But now, it was just old, dilapidated and sad; just another landmark attesting to the planet's decay. 

"This place looks like it'll fall down on our heads any second." Owen remarked, giving the building a distasteful look. "Are we sure we even want to go in there?"

"Yes." Ianto answered for Jack and the Doctor. "Tosh and Cale are in there. My PDA says this is the place." He consulted the device. "Approximately one eighth of a mile from out current location, far right corner of the building. I can't give an exact location; the room seems to be shielded. But, like everything else on this planet, the shield seems to be failing."

"We'll have a definite location in a bit, then." The Doctor surmised, mind spinning a mile a minute. He began to walk forward, intending on implementing his and Jack's ruse.

"Wait!" Jack called, freezing the Doctor in his tracks. He looked at Ianto's PDA briefly before looking up at the Doctor, a dangerous grin on his face and a hard look in his eyes. "I have a better way in."

DWT

"Stop squirmin'!" Cale growled at Toshiko for what seemed like the hundredth time in the past sixty seconds. He winced and braced himself harder against the sharp wall. 

Luckily for them, the vent had been installed two feet from the rear wall in the cell, enabling them to get a better balance than standing in the middle of the room. Holding someone on your shoulders was harder than it looked in the movies and Cale was beginning to question his sanity for suggesting the idea. It really wasn't getting them anywhere, at all.

"I can't!" Tosh snapped back, shifting her weight on Cale's shoulders again. She reached out once again for the vent and this time, managed to grab a hold of one of the metal slats. "I've got one! Ow. It's cutting into my hand. I don't think this is gonna work, Cale."

"We don't have much of a choice." Cale informed her calmly, expertly hiding his desperation. "It's either this or someone dies. Pull!"

"I am!" Tosh shouted back with a grunt. She grit her teeth and pulled harder, frantically trying to push the pain of the rusted metal cutting into the soft flesh of her palm out of her mind. She was going to need some serious tetanus shots after this, she was sure.

Suddenly, the metal pulled free and Tosh lost her precarious balance. With a shriek, she toppled, taking Cale with her. The two of them impacted the hard metal floor, the rust digging into knees, shoulder, shins and cheeks. Tosh let out a silent groan and slowly pushed to her feet, wincing at the pain in both of her hands. She would be useless for prying open a panel, much less working with the delicate insides. She hoped Cale knew how to take instructions. 

"That hurt like hell." Cale observed unnecessarily. He sighed ruefully, flexing his shoulders and pushing the stinging pain from his cuts to the back of his mind. He could deal with that later, he'd had worse anyway. He stood in front of the panel, cocked his head to the side and eyed it for a long moment. 

"Okay. Metal, please." He held out his scrapped hand to Tosh who dutifully placed the rough piece of alien metal into Cale's hand. He shared a brief smile with Tosh. "He goes nuthin'."

With that, he pushed the smallest, sharpest end of the metal against the gap between the control panel and the wall. It barely fit inside, if at all. Cale swallowed the desperate sound that rose up in his throat and pushed harder, fighting the blind panic that was welling up from his gut. He didn't need that, not now. He couldn't break down; he had to save Toshiko, save himself. He pressed again, grunting with the effort, wincing against the pain of the metal slicing into his hand. He pushed harder, then suddenly his face met the wall as the metal flew out of his hands and onto the floor. 

"No! Dammit! No!" Cale shouted, voice barely intelligible. 

"Cale! Calm down!" Tosh ordered sharply, bending to pick up the piece of metal. She gave Cale a stern look. "We'll get out of here." She smiled. "I have an idea."

Tosh walked over to the panel, gently moving Cale from her line of sight. She fingered the raised buttons, paying close attention to the space in between the button and the panel itself. That gap looked bigger than the one that connected the panel to the wall. She grinned, hope blooming in her chest.

"If this panel works like our keyboards back at home, I'll have us out in a jiffy." Tosh told the distressed teen, still smiling. Taking a deep breath, she pushed the metal in, under the green oval-shaped button and levered up. It didn't budge. She wasn't strong enough. 

"Cale, help me push, I'm not strong enough." The teen nodded and walked over, grabbing Toshiko's hands in his own bloody ones. 

Their hands were slick with sweat and blood as they pushed against the metal piece. Tosh could feel it biting into her hand even more. This wasn't going to work with her cut down to her bones, she needed to stop. 

"Cale, wait!" She ordered, the pain she was feeling coming out in her voice. Cale immediately let go of her hands and stepped back. 

Tosh pulled the metal slat out of the button and used the sharp end to cut off a piece of her shirt. She expertly wrapped it around her damaged hand, then used another strip to protect her good hand. She smiled encouragingly at Cale. 

"I felt it move before we stopped. I just couldn't go on with this thing cutting into my hand. C'mon, let's try again. We'll get it, I promise." 

Cale simply nodded and moved once again to help her, completely ignoring the blood dripping from his palm down onto the rusted, sharp floor. 

DWT

"Jack, that's insane." Gwen informed him bluntly, hands set defiantly on her hips. 

"I think it's a bloody fine idea." Owen countered, malicious grin on his face. "If we can fry those bastards in the process, the more the merrier as far as I'm concerned."

"It certainly has a better chance for success than your other idea; I'll give you that, Jack." The Doctor acknowledged, face solemn. "I'll go along with it only because the Agents have a chance to escape. I'm done with saving those who don't deserve it at the expense of others. I'm too old for that."

"Okay, now for the obvious question," Gwen started after an uncomfortable pause, "what the hell are we gonna do about that cabbie?"

Jack blinked at her as if she had just spoken Chinese, then turned his head to look at the cabbie, who was shouting at them and obscenely gesturing to be paid. 

Jack chuckled mirthlessly. "Let him stew. We're gonna need him if we want to get outta here alive."

"Works for me." Ianto agreed cheerfully. 

"Good." Jack shared a briefly smile with Ianto before addressing the group. "Okay, Owen, I still want you out here manning the PDA, we need to know what's goin' on inside if we're gonna do this. 

"Ianto, Doctor, I want you to engage the waste flush, then get the hell outta there. Gwen, you and I are gonna go lookin' for Tosh and Cale. We need to find them and get out in under ten minutes, or we'll be caught in the super heated flush along with the Time Agents. Any questions?"

The Doctor raised his hand. "Uh, yeah. Where, exactly, are the flush controls, Jack?"

"Ianto?" Jack prompted. 

Ianto showed the Doctor the PDA. Six blue lights were flashing on the screen, two of them Tosh and Cale, the other four belonging to the Time Agents that were holding them hostage. Three dots were standing next to Cale and Tosh, one dot was in the middle of the screen, towards the back. Their entrance. They'd have to incapacitate him in order to get in. In the middle, just a few yards from the back entrance, was a room highlighted in red. That was the flush control room they needed to enter and arm.

"Owen will guide us once we're inside the treatment plant." Ianto told the Doctor as he passed the PDA to Owen. "You remember how to operate this?"

"Well, duh." Owen told him with a nasty look. "I still don't understand, though. We don't have an exact location on Cale and Tosh, how are you gonna get them out and get outta there in under ten minutes, Jack?"

"It's an area of ten square yards. That's close enough to find them in under thirty seconds. In all likelihood, they're in the only room in that remote vicinity, anyway. We won't have to look very hard." Jack answered swiftly, already moving towards the right of the building to enter from the back. 

It was a bit of a hike, but he was sure they'd be alright. He hoped, anyway. 

"Right, one more thing." Gwen said, jogging to catch up with Jack's long strides. "How are Ianto and the Doctor going to engage the flush procedures?"

"Sonic-screwdriver." The Doctor answered simply. "The alarms will go off, clearing the area for you and Jack to find Cale and Tosh. There'll probably be one guard left, but you can handle him without so much as blinking, I bet."

"This plan might actually work." Owen observed, sounding rather surprised. "Our plans never work."

"That inspires me with so much confidence, thank you." Jack said sarcastically over his shoulder.

"Well, it's true. Things never go the way they should." Owen returned snappishly. 

"That's because I wasn't there to help." The Doctor returned with a cheeky smile. "My plans always work."

"You never have a plan." Jack told him with a smirk. 

"Exactly."

DWT

"Just a little bit more!" Toshiko grunted out, muscles straining with the effort of pushing against the button. 

"Sure." Cale returned as blandly as he could, teeth clenched and arms shaking with the effort. His hands were slick, and red, making it hard for him to keep his grip around Toshiko's smaller hands. 

Cale grit his teeth and pushed harder, forcing Tosh's hands roughly into the metal. He was beyond the point of caring though. Every atom of his being was screaming at him to get out of this place, to run, as far and as fast as he possibly could. Everything about it was wrong. His mind was flashing, showing him white-masked figures and a premonition of pain. He knew what would happen if they both stayed here. The Time Agency would eventually kill them both, he knew. 

"Leavin'! Now!" Cale shouted. He forced his muscles to work, yelling out in pain with the effort, and suddenly, all the resistance gave way. He yelped, once again impacting with the sharp wall and further cutting up his right cheek. 

"Ow!" Tosh exclaimed, rapidly backing away from the wall and cradling her left, injured hand. She looked to the left on the floor and suddenly grinned. "Cale. We did it! We broke the piece!"

"Neat." Cale gasped, panting. He gingerly pushed away from the wall with a groan. He turned, bracing himself carefully and peered into the hole they had made. "Wow. We just need to cut away this membrane and we'll have access to the wires. I can see them through this strange filmy stuff."

"Really?" Tosh inquired, walking closer to inspect the panel's innards over Cale's shoulder. She peered intently at it for a moment before speaking to Cale. "Cale, can you move over? I think I can get us out of here in just a minute."

"Yeah, sure." Cale stepped back. He stared blankly into space for a moment before his eyes went wide. "Tosh…what happens when we open the door? There's guards outside. How do we plan to get outta here? We're unarmed and injured. This isn't gonna work."

"We'll just have to take them out." Tosh told him determinedly, poking carefully around at the wires. She bent down and picked up the metal vent slat, feeling her stomach flop at the blood that nearly completely covered the little piece. Her and Cale's blood. 

"How?" Cale asked, gesturing wildly. "We only have one object that could even be remotely considered a weapon! It's a bloody metal slat! And I mean that literally."

"I know!" Toshiko whirled around and snapped at him, brown eyes blazing. "But it's just like you said, we don't have a choice. It's this or we die, Cale. I choose to try. So sorry if you're too chicken shit to even entertain the idea!"

"So what if I'm afraid?" Cale nearly screamed back at her. "I have good reason to be! These people tortured me, used me, broke me! I'm just a shell, Tosh. An empty, scared shell. They own me from the grave, to the grave."

"No, they don't." Tosh told him calmly, sympathy shining from her eyes. "There's one thing they can't own, can't take from you. That's your soul, Cale. Your will to live. They haven't stolen that, just made you think they have. You can do this, I know you can. Help me get us out alive and you'll have beaten them. Permanently."

Cale stood there staring at her for a long time, looking through her really. He blinked his head moving with the motion before his eyes focused and he seemed to come back to himself. He looked her in the eyes and Tosh was struck with how _alive_ they looked. She hadn't realized how dead they had been until this very moment. 

"Okay." Cale walked over to the control panel and looked inside. He peeled away the film, took the metal slat from Tosh, then sliced open some wires. He swiftly rearranged them and reconnected them, then cut some more.

Sparks flew and he winced, pushing past the brief sting of electricity. A few more moments of fiddling, then he stepped back, triumphant grin on his face. "All we have to do is press the blue button when we're ready to leave."

"Where did you learn to do that?" Tosh asked, awe leaking into her voice with a little bit of jealousy. 

"I lived on the streets. That became a necessity at a young age." Cale informed her, voice falsely light. 

"Right."

DWT

"_Take a left at the next door_." Owen told Ianto over their earpieces. After a brief fight with the system, the Doctor had managed to get them working again by routing them through Jack's Vortex Manipulator. 

"Acknowledged." Was Ianto's clipped reply. He turned to the Doctor and repeated what Owen had told him in a stage whisper. They were almost to the flush room; it was just around the corner if he could remember the map properly. 

"How do you think Jack and Gwen did with that Agent?" The Doctor asked, curiosity finally getting to him. 

"I imagine Jack cracked him over the head with the butt of his gun." Ianto responded, pausing briefly to think about it. 

"Ouch." The Doctor winced in sympathy. Suddenly, he brightened and shrugged. "Well,'s not like he didn't deserve it. He'll recover anyway."

"Most likely." Ianto agreed, turning left at the door as Owen had instructed. Straight down the short hallway was an old, barely readable sign over and equally old door. It was just what they had been looking for. "There it is."

"Oh, yes!" The Doctor exclaimed, taking off at a run. He paused, then spun around to glare at Ianto. "Hurry up!"

Ianto rolled his eyes skyward and jogged after him. 

DWT

Jack crept carefully around the corner, gun held at the ready. He stepped cautiously, eyes rapidly roving over the old hallway, scanning for any sign of movement. He had yet to hear the waste flush alarms go off, so he could only assume that the three Time Agents guarding Toshiko and Cale were still there. It wasn't a comforting thought, but he really didn't have time to dwell on it. If the Doctor and Ianto couldn't get the flush working, then they would just have to take out the three remaining Agents. 

He couldn't help but wonder, though, why the Agents hadn't killed Tosh. It didn't really make a whole lot of sense to keep her alive. Unless they were planning to use her as leverage, then it made sense. If they thought Cale wouldn't cooperate without some sort of incentive then they would keep Tosh around. It wasn't a strictly pleasant thought, but it gave him hope that Toshiko was alright. Maybe not unharmed, but still alive and in once piece. 

That had to be enough for now. He could curse the fates later. He had his entire existence for that, after all. No man had more time to think, rant and rave than he did. 

"_Right, down the hall, then duck behind something, because that's where the Agents are, Jack_." Owen told them over the earpieces. 

"Copy." Jack answered tersely, pitching his voice low. He adjusted his grip on his gun and stopped, pressing himself tightly against the wall. 

He peered around the corner and spotted the Agents. This was going to be near impossible if Ianto and the Doctor didn't enable the fluid flush in the next thirty seconds. Jack turned his head and locked eyes with Gwen, who was standing behind him, also flush against the wall, gun held ready. She didn't want to rush into this any more than he did, but in a minute, that wouldn't matter anymore. They had to get their people out, and they had to do it now. 

Suddenly, loud, wailing alarms sounded throughout the waste treatment plant. Jack and Gwen shared a grin and leaned around the wall to watch two of the Agents sprint off in the direction of the grating, nerve-wracking noise. There was just the green-skinned human look-a-like left. Easy pickings as far as Jack was concerned. The man was just a human with altered skin genes, nothing truly special about him. Nothing to make him difficult to overpower. 

"Ianto, Doc, they're on their way." Jack informed the other half of his team through the earpieces. He looked at Gwen, voice pitched low. "Okay, creep up, distract, then stun gun. Only shoot if we have too."

"Understood, Jack." Gwen responded, voice just as soft. She holstered her gun and drew her stun gun from the other holster on her left hip. She was the only one who had thought to bring her stun gun. It showed how much more human she was as compared to the rest of them. 

Jack grinned widely at her, flashing his perfect teeth, then stepped boldly out into the hallway. 

"Hey!" He called to the discolored human, grin turning coy. He sauntered up to the confused man, still smiling. "You bored? 'Cause man, I know I am." He crowed inwardly, seeing the effect his smile was having on the unsuspecting man. "Captain James Harper and you are?"

"Krell Telos." The man answered, smiling back, completely forgetting what he was doing there in the first place. 

"Nice to meet you, Krell Telos." Jack inched closer, invading the man's personal space. He could sense Gwen just behind him and strove to keep the Agent's attention. "So, what are you doin' in this dump? Can you spare a minute?"

"For you, damn well bet I can." The human responded, a sick sort of grin on his face. Just as he was leaning in to kiss Jack, Gwen struck, electrifying his entire body with the stun gun. He went down with a startled yelp and an indignant look. 

"Can't say I'm sorry for missing that opportunity." Jack said, kicking the unconscious man's body to the side. He tapped his earpiece. "Right, Owen, which room are Tosh and Cale in? There's about a dozen lining this hallway." 

"_I dunno._" Owen answered, sounding frustrated. "_The shielding still hasn't completely collapsed yet. They're still in the same place they were before. The dots are all fuzzy-like. Good news though, the Doc and Ianto are out here safely with me. And the other two Agents are still in the flush room. They can't seem to turn it off._"

"Well, thanks for that small mercy." Jack replied sarcastically. He growled in frustration and reached out to punch the panel nearest to him when the door suddenly slid open. 

He and Tosh shared a stunned look for a brief moment, both shocked to see the other on the opposite side of the door. Tosh recovered first, launching herself at Jack and hugging him tightly, relief sinking into her very bones. She let go after a moment, suddenly remembering the alarms which had prompted her and Cale to open the door in the first place. The sound was extremely worrying. 

"You're okay!" Gwen exclaimed, coming over. She peered into the cell and spotted a bloody and worn Cale. His hands were completely red, and there were smears of blood up past his elbows. The knees were scraped, pants torn, and his thighs had smears of blood on them. The bottom of his shirt looked redder than the rest of it, and his right cheek had several deep cuts adorning the soft skin. 

"Oh my God! Jack, look at the poor boy! Cale, are you alright? Come on out, we need to leave, now." Gwen said, concern lacing her voice. 

Cale shrugged indifferently and walked out into the hallway. "Not much different out here. What's that noise?"

"The waste flush alarms." Jack answered, tone clipped. He nudged Tosh's shoulder. "Gwen's right, Toshiko. We need to leave, now. We have eight minutes to get outta here before we get boiled alive by super-heated industrial waste." 

"Then what are we waitin' for?" Cale exclaimed, alarmed. He took off down the hallway, Gwen, Jack and Toshiko following quickly after him. 

The young teen lead the way out of the waste treatment plant, following Jack's desperately shouted directions, which were tersely relayed by Owen through the earpieces. Jack kept glancing at his watch and cursing every time he did. He wasn't sure if they were going to make it out. The place was beginning to heat up. He could feel the energy prickling along his arms, giving him goosebumps. 

They tore down the last hallway, footsteps and heart beats echoing in their ears. They could see the gray light from the outside just ahead as the heat began to really pick up in the plant. Jack pushed his legs harder, pelting down the rusted hallway as fast as his immortal legs would carry him. He could see Gwen and Tosh out of the corner of his eyes and Cale's bloody back in front of him. They were gonna make it, they had too. 

Failure wasn't an option on this mission. 

His chest heaved and his lungs burned with the effort of running. The light from the door got steadily brighter and bigger as he ran, desperation clawing ravenously at his insides. The heat began to burn; sizzling along his skin and making him sweat more than he had in his entire life. He could hear the swishing, rushing sound of the flush just barely over his own pounding pulse. Toshiko and Gwen's clanging footsteps remained constant right next to him. 

Cale's bloody back was slowly pulling away from them as the frightening teenager put on an even greater burst of speed. Jack was irrationally jealous of the boy's ability to run so quickly at that very moment in time. 

Suddenly, the air was bitingly cold and wet as they burst out into the space behind the waste plant. Ianto slammed the door shut behind them and took off with them, tearing around the corner of the waste treatment plant and sprinting towards the cab. They could see the Doctor and Owen arguing with the cabbie in the distance as they sprinted. It was raining, plastering their clothing and hair to their bodies. 

No one cared.

The walls of the waste plant began to disintegrate under the heat. 

Cale skidded to a halt by the cab, diving into the back seat with a terror born quickness. The Doctor and Owen followed shortly after, hurriedly making room for Jack, Gwen and Ianto. Gwen reached the cab first, and jumped in, slamming into Owen's cold, unforgiving body. Ianto followed next, tripping and falling in after Jack shoved him. The Captain stumbled in next and slammed his fist down on the blue button that materialized the door. 

Just as the door was in place, the cabbie stood on the accelerator and they cleared the platform just as it melted into unrecognizable goo. 

"Holy hell!" Cale exclaimed, chest heaving as he panted for breath. His blue eyes were bright and alive as he looked around the cab. His shirt collar was a deep red, soaked with blood and rain water. His hair was matted with the same mix, and so were the back of his shirt and the knees of his torn space pants. He looked a right state. "That was the biggest mess I have _ever_ been in!"

"All hail the adrenaline junkies." Owen remarked sarcastically. He seemed outwardly unaffected, but everyone in the cab knew differently. He looked at Toshiko. "Are you okay, Tosh? You look a little rough."

"I'm fine." Tosh answered, just barely getting her breath back. "Just cut my hand. Cale is worse off than I am."

"I'll second that." The Doctor answered, inspecting Cale as best he could in the cramped cab. "Is there any part of you that isn't scraped or covered in blood, Cale? On second thought, don't answer that. I really don't wanna know. Well, maybe I do. Or not."

"I think my shins remain untouched." Cale said wryly, sharing a brief smile with the Doctor. He looked over at Jack. "Thank you. For savin' me. I didn't think there was a Time Agent in existence who would save me. Guess you proved me wrong."

"I'm prone to doin' that." Jack answered, giving Cale a quick grin. He sobered. "But, seriously though, are you alright? Did they do this to you? You look like someone beat the hell outta you."

"It was the cell." Tosh answered for him. "The floor and walls were sharp with rust. He fell several times. We used a sharp piece of metal from the vent to open the door and we both cut open our hands on it. We need tetanus shots as soon as possible, Jack."

Cale looked down at his hands. "I'm sticky and leakin' all over this cab."

"I'm sure the cabbie doesn't mind." Ianto tossed the cabbie a dangerous smile in the rearview mirror. The green man wisely kept silent. He was still shocked from the events at the waste plant. 

"Sure." Cale said hollowly. He leaned back in his seat, titling his head back. "Wake me when we get there."

"Not even then." The Doctor told him quietly, smiling softly. 

"Hmm." Cale hummed, eyes shut as he drifted off to sleep. 

DWT

The taxi ride was quiet, no one wanting to wake the sleeping teen. No one had the heart too. The boy looked worked over, so did Toshiko. The cell had done a number on them, but apart from cuts and scrapes, they were both alright. It was nothing a few stitches, band-aids, a good night's rest and a few days off of work couldn't cure. They'd all had worse, Jack was sure. The cab pulled up to the curb where they had originally set out from, and Jack opened the door. 

He stepped out into the pouring rain and looked up at the gray, cloud-covered sky. This planet had always been dreary and depressing. Now they had front page news courtesy of the Doctor and Torchwood. This would be hell to report. He wasn't sure if he even wanted too, to be honest. The Doctor had been with them, after all. Reporting him would be the biggest mistake of his life, Jack was sure. Best to let this entire incident fly under the radar, as it were. 

"Thank you." Ianto told the cabbie, tossing him some notes. They probably weren't worth much on this planet, but the gesture meant enough. 

"Are these real?" The cabbie asked navy eyes bright. 

"Yes." Ianto answered, frowning in confusion. 

"You just handed me _real_ British pound notes?" The cabbie repeated, stunned. "I'm rich! I'm bloody rich!" With that, he rematerialized the door and zoomed away, joining traffic. 

"Well," The Doctor said, smiling with his hands in his pockets. He looked over at Cale, who was standing next to him, "at least someone is happy about all of this. Someone oughta be, after all of the trouble we went through, don't you think?"

"Sure." Cale said around a yawn. He turned around and looked at the TARDIS. "I really, _really_ want to go now. I don't think I can stay standin' for another minute. You have a bed in that fancy ship of yours, yeah?"

"Tons of them." The Doctor answered, leading the way over to his ship. He opened the door and smiled, ushering everyone inside, then locked the doors securely. "Take your pick, Cale. You've earned it."

"Damn straight." Cale said around another yawn. He wandered off down a hallway, trusting the TARDIS to guide his steps. 

"Well, that was slap and a tickle." Owen said wryly, grabbing a hold of the railing as the Doctor started the familiar process of starting up the TARDIS. 

"Tell me about it." Gwen bemoaned, smiling. "I don't think I've ever had that much excitement in one day. Well, if you don't count my wedding day or Abaddon."

"I've had quicker days." Jack told them casually. He smiled. "Things tend to get crazy when you travel with the Doctor."

"I'll drink to that." Ianto deadpanned. 

"I could use a drink." Toshiko grumbled, wincing at her various aches and pains, but still smiling nonetheless.

"To home, my good friends!" The Doctor cheerfully announced from his place at the TARDIS controls.

Their laughter was drowned out by the sounds and motions of the TARDIS taking them home. It had been one helluva day, that was for damn sure. The best part was though, the Doctor reflected. Was that the adventure was far from over. At least, for him and Cale. He was sure Jack and his team would want to keep their feet firmly planted on Earth soil for the next few decades. 

He smiled as the TARDIS entered the Vortex, sending them hurling towards twenty-first century Cardiff, approximately three days after they had left. It was one of the best days he had ever had. 

El Fin

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End of chappie 5. Review! Hope ya liked it. 


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